i i 
(if 
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11 ii 
148 
for a whole mile in a straight line without a 
break.” 
‘‘We kept them in limits as much as possible, 
killing the outside birds first, and in this way 
many flocks slept their last sleep. Many times a 
day we would secure a whole flock, or nearly a 
whole one, at one firing, and fifty to seventy 
birds was a usual day's hunt.” 
‘‘In the fall they sold promptly at $1.00 per 
pair. Then I put up more partridges, five bar¬ 
rels, placing them alongside of frozen turkeys. 
When the turkeys were sold I did not realize on 
two cars as much profit as I did on the five 
barrels of ‘birds, when I discontinued racking 
poultry entirely. Along after the early 8o’s Col. 
Bond was buying large quantities of frozen par¬ 
tridges from Minnesota, and they were whole 
birds, but the market was full of them. T com¬ 
menced buying of him and packed away several 
thousand pair at about 16 to 20 cents each, i'ney 
sold well in the fall following at $1.25 per pair, 
and later at $1.50 before the fall price dropped 
again. Markets had now improved so much, 
trade was stimulated and a new dealer appeared 
in St. Paul with whom I connected later, and 
who. in a few years, monopolized the North¬ 
western trade. I took several thousand pairs of 
him at $4.25 per dozen.” 
“The Great West has seen but one happy 
FOREST AND S TR E AM 
Chariton Bottoms, immense numbers were killed. 
At Beardstown and Burlington thousands were 
shipped. Only in the last ten years haye the 
numbers commenced to fall off. You will not 
now collect in the whole State of Illinois as 
many as we used to get in one week in Henry 
County in i860.” 
“■Somewhat about 1885 we had our last flood 
of ducks. They were in surfeit, mostly mallards. 
The waters of the Mississippi were congested 
with them. The same occurred along the Chari¬ 
ton in Missouri, and doubtless many other points. 
The birds were not hard to reach. It was winter 
time and the slaughter kept up until it was nearly 
spring. As one flock was destroyed new ones 
came in. Whole carloads were killed and sent 
to market and sold at ridiculously low prices. 
Where freezers were to be had, hundreds of 
barrels were carried over into the next year. 
If you can believe that short time destroyed 
them altogether as it did the pigeons a little 
later, then you have no need of hunting or of 
laws.” 
“The best hunters killed as high as one hun¬ 
dred birds each in one day and in one season 
when a swivel gun was brought into use it was 
reported that fifty or more blue .wings were often 
killed at one shot. Good teal shooting was then 
Taking the Spoils to Market—A Later Method. 
hunting ground. We do not know where it wiil 
ever find another. Henry County, in the valley 
of the Mississippi, has held more game than any 
land of its size in the world. If the myriads that 
have possessed it should lift up their wings like 
the cherubim in Ezekiel, the thunders of their 
voices would drown Niagara.” 
“We calculated there was killed in Illinois in 
those thirty years no less than two thousand 
dozen each year, and the market was large 
enough to take and consume them all at paying 
prices.” 
“The question might be raised whether the 
summer shooting has not done more harm than 
all the laws have done good. The killing of 
summer birds has run into the millions in Iowa 
and Nebraska, and Minnesota, and in Illinois 
has approximated a ratio nearly as great.” 
“There is no country where greater bags have 
been made than in Henry County. Many t'mes 
have one hundred (jack snipe) been taken in a 
day and exceeded. In one case a hundred and 
thirty' were killed in one day with a muzzle 
'loader on Mud Creek. Southern Illinois was a 
fruitful haunt for them many years. The Carlyle 
Bottoms were famous. In Missouri, along the 
the rule in October until away along in the 8o’s.” 
“In October the quail were put on the market, 
a large amount of them, and sold well. Brices 
continued high all the season, the highest for 
chickens and quails at that time we had ever 
known. Buyers took stock readily and put it 
into consumption. By the time the spring opened 
we had realized out of it over $20,000.” 
And so on, in sickening detail, the pages of 
the book from which the quotations above were 
taken, go on to tell of a business that ruined 
the greatest game country that ever existed in 
the world. Now, there is no need to excoriate 
H. Clay Merritt individually. The picture of him 
published in 'his book shows him to be an ami¬ 
able, mild sort of citizen, something after the 
Undle Sam type. He pursued, so far as the law 
was concerned, a legitimate business, and prob¬ 
ably felt that he was doing no more evil than 
the ordinary stock farmer or poultry raiser. 
But just stop to think that he was only one of 
dozens and perhaps hundreds of men following 
the same trade, and that his tales of shipment of 
thousands of dozens of birds, could be duplicated 
hundreds of times over! 
When our younger sportsmen ask where the 
game has gone, let them pick up books such as 
the one I have been quoting from; let them go 
over the early files of F-orest and Stream and 
then if they feel that the laws now are too re¬ 
pressive and that ducks, for instance, should be 
shot during the spring season, they may under¬ 
stand why it is that stringency of statute is abso¬ 
lutely necessary to preserve the small amount of 
wild life we have. 
What might have happened had it not been 
that Forest and Stream, more than twenty years 
ago, succeeded in forcing on the statutes of this 
country the non-sale of game proviso, that put 
Merritt and his class out of business, is only to 
be conjectured, but so nearly a certainty that it 
may be said that the lead taken by Forest and 
Stream, supported by thousands of true sports¬ 
men the country over, is the sole reason we have 
to-day for thankfulness that any game is left. 
The older sportsmen of America know what 
your good journal 'has done; the younger ones 
realize it only imperfectly, and become impatient 
sometimes at your editorial attitude of conserva¬ 
tion, but if the truth could be put before therm 
they ought—and doubtless would—want to take 
off their hats to the grand journal that has saved 
them something for their enjoyment to-day. 
GUIDE BOOK TO GLACIER NATIONAL 
PARK. 
Because of the increasing interest in Glacier 
National Park the United States Geological Sur¬ 
vey has just published, as Bulletin 600, a guide to 
its geology and scenery, by Marius R. Campbell. 
The scenic features of ‘the park are truly alpine 
in their character, consisting of a wonderful com¬ 
bination of rugged mountains, valleys bounded by 
almost vertical walls from a few hundred to more 
than 4,000 feet in height, glaciers perched among 
the summits in protected- places, beautifully tim¬ 
bered, slopes, leading down by graceful curves to 
the bottoms of the valleys, and scores of lakes 
that are unsurpassed by any to be found in sunny 
Italy or the more rugged region-, of Switzerland. 
This rare combination of scenic beauty is found 
not alone in one valley of the park but is Char¬ 
acteristic of them all, and it is difficult to select 
any particular part that is more beautiful than 
the others. 
IT IS THE CAT! 
Naturalists statistically rank the felis domesti- 
cus as third in the bird destroying agents, hold¬ 
ing every roaming cat responsible for the lives 
of at least fifty birds a year. A game warden 
who reports 200 quail killed by a mother cat in 
less than a year on the game preserve, advo¬ 
cates the wholesale extermination of cats under 
the supervision of a game warden. The value of 
the cat to catch mice or rats is disputed by a 
bifid enthusiast, who maintains that this Nero of 
the animal world will hush forever the joyous 
song of any little feathered chorister, simply for 
his own amusement when not in need of food. 
When he dines he goes after a cold bird in pref¬ 
erence to any other delicacy, and will catch mice 
or rats only as a last resort. 
